Loathing
by Sofricus Aurora Zakuro
Summary: Madame Pontmercy, I loathe you more than any human being I have ever had the misfortune of meeting. AU-ish. M/C, hinted J/JVJ


**Loathing**

**By Sofri**

**A/n: **First attempt at this fandom and any of these characters, so it may not be that great….It's my present to myself for finishing NaNoWriMo, so it's probably not my best work. Warning: hinted slash, J/JVJ

**Summary: **Madame Pontmercy, I loathe you more than any human being I have ever had the misfortune of meeting. (Sort of M/C and hinted J/JVJ, probably OOC. AU-ish)

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"But….but Monsieur, can't I at least speak to my husband?"

Cosette Pontmercy banged her fists against the hardwood desk, attempting to convey her current state of extreme distress to the blank-faced clerk on the other side. Unfortunately, the young man, a portly fellow with a complexion like milk pudding and eyes like a dead fish, was as unaffected by her display of emotions as he was by the tousled hair and disheveled dress that betrayed her inability to speak.

"Madame, we have obtained conclusive proof of Baron Pontmercy's—your husband's—involvement in the student uprisings that happened several months ago. As the event has been classified as a 'disturbance of the peace,' we had no choice but to arrest him. His trial date has been set," the clerk intoned in his nasal, whiny voice, obviously bored with the situation.

"But Monsieur…." Cosette began again, her pale fingers gripping the rough edges of the desk as she wracked her brain to come up with another argument. Changing her tactic for what felt like the hundredth time, the brunette woman attempted to appeal to whatever spark of kind, good humanity might lay dormant behind those dead-fish eyes. "But Monsieur le….Clerk…my Marius is the sole survivor of the barricades," she begged, neglecting of course to mention the one other survivor (having discovered only weeks before that her adopted father was actually an escaped convict, she didn't want to bring his name into any dealings with the law) "He's coping with the loss of almost every single one of his friends. He's in a state of extreme mental distress. You can't…you can't really mean to try him in court! He's not sane, I tell you!"

The meaningful look the pasty faced man sent her clearly told Cosette that he didn't think her now-arrested husband, Marius Pontmercy, was the insane one in this situation. "Madame Pontmercy, if you have a complaint, I suggest you…" He glanced around the spacious antechamber, obviously trying to find another person in the Prefect's employ on which to dump Cosette. "….take it up with the officer responsible for arresting your husband."

For the first time displaying emotion, the clerk pointed joyfully at a tall, imposing man who had just entered the room from the hallway leading to Monsieur le Prefect's office.

"Ah, Monsieur," Cosette's eyes lit up as she seized the faint hope the new arrival provided her. "I was wondering if I could speak with you on the matter of my husband's arrest…"

The man arched an eyebrow. Studying his figure, the woman felt some of that hope drown in the depths of her current despair. He seemed to be one of those rough edged, hard boiled men that were the stereotypical policeman—tall, ugly and wrinkled with tiny, angry eyes and absolutely humongous sideburns. The ferocious glare in those eyes and the way he grasped his nightstick, as though he were ready to attack her at a moment's notice, almost made Cosette turn around and hurry out of the building back to her home.

She was halfway turned around when her husband's scared, bewildered face and the thought of him being tied to a chain in a dark, horrible prison like her father had been for most of his life sprang into her mind. Steeling herself, Cosette again addressed the foreboding man. "Monsieur, I believe he was unfairly arrested and have valid reasons why you should release him immediately."

To her surprise, the policeman smiled. It was not a humorous smile—it was cold and showed his teeth, like the look a wolf might give his prey. Cosette was terrified, but she could not move until she had done whatever she could to free the love of her life from the clutches of this horrible, wolf-like man.

"Madame Pontmercy," she was surprised he knew her name but then remembered Marius's inability to go a single hour without talking about her and blushed slightly, "the proof we have of your husband's guilt may very well turn out to be completely inconclusive. His plea of mental illness brought on by the loss of almost every single human being he ever cared about may arouse sympathy in the hearts of the Prefect, or the judge, or both. Your husband may, as a matter of fact, be completely innocent and we the police may have made a grave mistake. But Madame Pontmercy," Cosette trembled at the terrifying emotions in the even more terrifying man's voice—rage and hate, both barely concealed by his veneer of professionalism, "the truth is, I don't give a damn."

Cosette gasped, both at his coarse use of language (surprising in a Paris policeman) and his bold, cruel statement. "W….wha…" She stuttered for a moment, unable to respond to such abject cruelty. She finally managed to stammer out what she realized was a completely idiotic question. "Then…Monsieur le Inspector, why did you arrest him?"

The wolf's grin was back. This time, Cosette did try to bolt for the door—but she had barely taken two steps when, seemingly without moving at all, the Inspector was standing in front of her, blocking her way out. His next words were a whisper obviously meant to prevent the pasty-faced clerk (who had been unabashedly eavesdropping) from overhearing.

"Because, Madame Pontmercy, I loathe you more than any human being I have ever had the misfortune of meeting."

Now Cosette was angry—angry for Marius, thinking of the cruel treatment he had obviously received at the hands of this heartless man, and angry for herself--no human being with anything resembling a heart likes to be told they are hated. "But you barely know me, Inspector…"

The smile still in place, the man filled in her silence. "Javert."

Then, everything was clear to Cosette. This was the man of whom her father had told her when he finally confessed the truth about his life to his dear adopted daughter. This was the policeman who had known her father at Toulon, where he'd been imprisoned; this was the policeman who had chased him throughout the rest of his life. He had nearly caught him at Montreil-sur-Mer, where her father had been disguised as the town's mayor "Madeleine," but her father had slipped through his grasping fingers. This was the man whose footsteps comprised one of her earliest memories—being chased through the streets Paris at night with her father's heart beating a wild tattoo and his fear so palpable the then-tiny Cosette could smell it. This was the man who had been a spy at the barricades, who had had a direct contribution to the death of the brave Enjolras and her Marius's other dear friends. This was the man whom her father had freed when the revolutionaries planned to kill him for his traitorous deeds, only to come back and arrest her father the very next day—no sort of repayment for saving his life. He had allowed her father to bring Marius to a doctor and come home to say farewell—and then he had inexplicably disappeared. This was the man who had struck fear into her heart as a child, who had haunted her dreams as an adult—this was the man who had been her father's greatest pursuer, the sole enemy in the life of Jean Valjean.

What Cosette knew she should have done at that moment was haughtily stand up and give that man some Hell of his own in return for the Hell he'd put her father through—call him cruel and heartless and maybe even slap that evil smile off of his face. What Cosette did do was cower, and shudder so strongly she knew he could see it, and stammer out, "I…I…thought it was…my father…you hated…"

To her surprise (my, this man, besides being her greatest enemy, was surely perplexing,) the smile disappeared. "I target Jean Valjean because it is my duty as a policeman. I target you, Madame Pontmercy, because I enjoy seeing you suffer."

_Now _she gave him a (albeit very small) piece of her mind. "You are a heartless man, Inspector Javert," she informed the policeman.

There was that horrible smile-grimace-smirk thing again. "I know."

The man's insolent, almost mocking tone sent Cosette over the edge. "Leave my father ALONE!" she practically shouted, not caring who overheard. The clerk sat up, his ears visibly perking as he watched the argument like it was some magnificent opera.

Once again, the tall Inspector did something that completely perplexed and startled Cosette. For a moment, the rough, horrible face of his softened into something remotely resembling sadness—to her, the effect was like a statue that had been carved with a smirk on its face attempting to frown. He startled her again by asking a question completely unrelated to her outburst. "Madame Pontmercy, how far would you go to find your Marius, if he was lost to you?"

Surprised by his question, she answered truthfully. "To the ends of the earth—nay, beyond. I would weather the fires of Hell for Marius Pontmercy."

He nodded. "There you have your answer."

She was about to respond with a snappish, almost petulant, "But I didn't ask a _question_," when suddenly, Inspector Javert turned on his heel and marched out of the room like a soldier performing a drill. He paused with one hand on the heavy oaken door, turning back for just a moment to send a remark in Cosette's direction, accompanied by the ghost of his former smirk. "Your husband's trial is set for the 15th of November, Madame Pontmercy."

And then, the utterly terrifying and confusing man that was Inspector Javert was gone from the room.

Cosette stood there for a moment—speechless, motionless, trying to comprehend the encounter that had just taken place.

After a moment, she gathered up her skirts with one hand and turned towards the unfortunate clerk at the desk, meaning to regain a few shreds of her shattered dignity by shooting a glare at the pasty-faced man.

Unfortunately, the clerk had fainted.


End file.
